40 Minutes In The Old Testament - Song of Solomon 4:7-5:1 (Episode 437)

Episode Date: October 21, 2024

The bride is made flawless. The garden of love is in bloom and the groom will unlock the gates. And the church has Christ and yet we wait. Have a listen. Show Notes: ·      HWSS NWA Support 1517 Podcast Network 1517 Podcasts 1517 on Youtube 1517 Podcast Network on Apple Podcasts 1517 Events Schedule 1517 Academy - Free Theological Education What's New from 1517: Junk Drawer Jesus By Matt Popovits Listen to 1517 Executive Director Scott Keith and Magnus Persson on the latest Re:Formera podcast Signup For Free Advent Church Resources for 2024 Clothed with Christ by Brian William Thomas The Inklings: Apostles and Apologists of the Imagination with Sam Schuldheisz More from the hosts: Daniel Emery Price Chad Bird

Welcome to another episode of 40 Minutes in the Old Testament. 40 Minutes in the Old Testament is a 1517 Podcast Network podcast. You can go to 1517.org slash podcast and check out all the other podcasts that are living over there. while you're over there make sure you check out everything else that 1517 is doing uh the registration is open to the here we still stand regional event in northwest arkansas it is uh been open for i don't know uh about 10 days or so uh at the time we're recording this it's over half full guys so uh you're gonna want to grab those tickets and uh if you want to come and you do want to come because it's two days it's fun chad will be there i'll be there it's

a good place to hang out if you've never been to bentonville arkansas which is of course it's a good spot it's an up-and-coming spot you won't regret it you'll like it and so uh come hang out that is april 25th and 26th so you can find the the info in the show notes also while you're over at the website slide on over like so maybe you've got uh you know what i'm gonna register for this conference which you should do and while you're registering for the conference and you've got the debit card out, might as well just go over to the donate link. This is a two birds, one stone kind of deal. And go over there, become a contributor. Yeah, you could become a reoccurring donor, make this stuff keep happening, make it all free. We appreciate it very much. And if you

already do that, thank you very much. You are the reason that we're able to do this. All right, Chad, we are in the Song of Solomon, chapter four. We ended with the bride and the groom showing up for the wedding. We got some pretty elaborate details. We've heard a lot from the bride. Last episode, we actually got to hear a lot from Solomon, and of course, what is he going to talk about? I mean, he's going to talk about all the things he loves about his bride, and of course, they're all physical. He just goes over the entirety of her appearance and talks about all the different parts of her he loves and uses compliments that probably don't translate to modern times, but

I'll tell you this, we haven't gotten to it yet, but she's going to take him as compliments. I think she's eating it up. Yeah, I'm sure she's finally, she's happy that he finally opened up. He's got quite the elaborate description. He stops at, in verse 5, he stops at her breast.

He doesn't go anywhere beyond that. Later in the Song of Songs, he will. But for now, yeah, that's where he stops there at 4 or 5. and then in verse six having described all of these beautiful qualities about her body he goes on to say until the day breeze and the shadows flee i will go away to the mountain of myrrh and the hill of frankincense which is probably just one more way of describing uh her her body parts

so uh it's kind of where we end with this physical description uh as far as the details go but he's He's going to continue, so we've got a ways to go here. Verse 7, picking it up there, he says, in kind of a summary fashion, you are altogether beautiful, my love. There is no flaw in you. I like this verse, Chad. It's a great verse. Because I like a verse that isn't true about anybody.

I like that kind of verse. We know what this is like. you know maybe if you you know you first you know you meet someone and and uh you know you're starting to get your affection stirred up and you're starting to really like this person and you and you might say something like she's perfect man she's perfect maybe you're telling your buddy about her she's perfect sure um but you know that of course this is not true i mean that there's no flaw i mean come on no that's not that's not a real thing but here's the thing i like about this verse is that, well, we might, you know, you might say to your wife, or I might say

to my wife, you're perfect. There's no flaw in you. They know you're lying. They don't believe that, that's for sure, right? They don't believe that about themselves. It's nice for you to say it. But here's what's cool about this, if you are taking a Christ and His bride approach, is that the only time that this can be said and have it be true is sort of if the groom is talking about his own righteousness, right, which he has now given to you, and then looks at you and says, you're perfect. There's not a single flaw in you. And this is, in fact, the way that Christ looks at the Church. I mean, it's without blemish. It is without spot or wrinkle. There is no flaw in it. But this is only because, of course, that he's looking at his own righteousness,

which he has gifted and given to the Church, and of course that righteousness is perfect. And so I like this verse as a...because there's a lot of, like, the human elements here we could talk about, and some of it's sort of humorous, because love is kind of ridiculous when it's this elaborate and exaggerated uh yeah and and you know even foolish i mean that's like everyone knows that that people that are like madly in love are like icky and foolish you're like good grief like just get a room right like you could do that in public but this is one of those times where you you have and this happens throughout the song of solomon where you drop there's this thing that's dropped in where you're sort of jolted back to remembering that this is ultimately

about Christ and his church, and you hear a line like this, and you're like, oh yeah, yeah, this is what this really means. Of course that's something some young guy would say to some girl that he was totally in love with, but it's not true. But in the case of Christ and his church, it is true. It is, yeah. Yeah, you alluded to the Ephesians 5 text where Christ has loved the church, giving himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, and here's the verse, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

Sounds like you have no flaws. No flaws, yeah. Now, of course, anyone who knows what happens in churches in this world might read that verse and be like, I'd really like to get to know this church, because that's not the church that I know. I'll become a member. Yeah, because all the churches that I've been in, they have plenty of wrinkles and blemishes, which of course is true when viewed at from our horizontal earthly perspective, of course, because the church is comprised of sinners who are by definition with blemish but yeah we're here talking about well exactly what ephesians says that christ has made her holy he's loved her and he's cleansed her by the washing of water with the word and he has decked herself decked

her out in his own robes of righteousness so just like you could say of christ there is no flaw in him. So you can say of his bride, there is no flaw in her. My beloved is mine, and I am my beloved's, right? Just like we saw, I think, in the last episode. You know what's great about God? And I do find it humorous that God does this thing where he's like, okay, there's only one way to please me right and that's that's through faith and then turns out there isn't any faith right like i'm looking to and fro will i find a faith on the earth no i won't uh there's no faith and dang it that's the only thing i'm pleased with that's this is quite the conundrum here and so he gives people faith he gifts it to him he creates it and and drops it in him and then

Acts super impressed With this It says Man that's some good faith Look at the quality of that That faith is amazing Well yeah It's yours

You made it He's very pleased With his own gift And this is the same way That you do the church He's like Oh man He looks around

And says There's a bunch of children Of darkness running around I can't marry any of these It's off to my son What am I going to do I need a flawless bride I know

I'll take my perfection And then I'll give it to him And then he's like man, that's a good-looking church. Yeah. Just like in creation. He makes everything, that's good, that's good,

that's good. And then he's like, oh, this is all very good. Well, yeah, of course, you made it. It's just the way that you want it to be. People do get this impression that the one component of all salvation

that we add is our faith. You know? So, you know, I mean, God has done almost everything. All I got out of supply then is the faith. He's got that 99%. I'm going to give that 1% of faith, and then it's a done deal. God's like, no, no, I'm going to give you that too. I'm going to give you, you need salvation?

I got you covered. You need righteousness? Got you covered. You need peace, wholeness, all that kind of stuff. And you need faith? I got that too. Well, that's a very humorous verse in the Gospels where at one point Jesus is astonished at someone's faith. He says, nowhere in Israel have I seen such faith.

And you're like, yeah, but I mean, it's just great that Jesus is astonished by a thing that he creates. Where do you think that came from? Yep, all to give to God. I am impressed with what I've done here. as well as well he should be yeah it's great it's great so uh verse eight uh he kind of shift to some mountain imagery uh as well as some animal we got some lions and leopards coming up here so he uh he says to her the solomon speaking to his bride christ speaking to his bride come with me from lebanon my bride come with me from lebanon depart from the peak of amana

that's uh one of the peaks in the uh i i did not know what this was i'd look this up the anti-lebanon range that's like on the border of syria and lebanon and it's the uh everything the headwaters of the amanus river but anyway up north of israel depart for me depart from the peak of amana from the peak of sinear and herman so that is i think most people are familiar with mount herman it's at uh tall mountain peak to north of israel where you it's usually you know covered in snow but this is two names for the same thing so uh it's about 9 200 feet tall tall mountain especially for that part of the world but sinear and uh sirion s-i-r-i-o-n and herman are all different names for the same place so it's kind of like horror in sinai you

know same place same mountain but different names so all both of these are kind of from the same area so depart from we might say leave the place that's far away that's kind of if you're from the perspective of jerusalem these these these places are way up north so go from there go from this inaccessible place and come to me and then he switches from the mountain imagery to animal imagery. He says, depart from the den of lions, from the mountains of leopards. And I think both kind of the mountain imagery and the lion leopard imagery are just metaphorical ways of saying, go from the place where it's far away and inaccessible and dangerous and guarded and all of that and come to me. So I don't want you far away. I want you close to where I am.

so that's verse eight uh then he he leaves behind that imagery is pretty typical for poetry he'll like lay it on thick with all of these images from creation and then he shifts to something else and that's what happens verse nine he says you have captivated my heart other translations will say something like stolen my heart or you have ravished my heart any kind of real intense romantic imagery that you want to use there uh that's what's happened she has completely hijacked his heart taking it captive you've captivated my heart my sister my bride now that sounds strange to our ears as does a lot of this because i never refer to my wife as my sister just like i'm sure most guys don't refer to their wife as their sister but this is pretty common in in ancient

poetry where you can refer to your your lover or your wife as your as your sister without any kind of i mean we hear that we think in terms of incestuous stuff going on that's not in any way implied here all the saying is this is just kind of a pet name you know my sister my bride my love all kinds of language used to describe the one who is near and dear to his heart so you've captivated my heart my sister my bride chad you and i uh are a lot of things uh in relation to christ so we would be uh one of the ones that's weird to us is that we're the bride of christ it's a little weird for you and i uh we're also uh christ is our elder brother that's less weird where you're like that's my older brother uh now for a woman and you say hey you're the bride of

Christ, that probably doesn't feel as uncomfortable. But if Christ is my elder brother, that would make me his younger brother. But if your wife, Stacey, if Christ is her elder brother, that would make her his little sister. But she remains also the bride of Christ. There you go. And so, like, if you're thinking about the context of the Church, like, yes, you could be both sister and bride to Christ. In fact, if you're a woman, you are both of those things.

Yeah, you just have to get comfortable with what might initially strike you as just kind of a strange and uncomfortable mixing of images, because there's, you know, our relationship to God is described in different ways. You know, we're His servants. That's very true. But we're also his friends. We're also his children. We're also brothers and sisters in Christ.

We're also part of his bride. And I think all of these are just trying to capture, with various images from creation, various relationships we have, exactly who we are to him. Well, I mean, or think about this. I mean, I know women don't like this. I mean, at least a lot of the women I've talked to.

Wives don't like what I'm about to say, and I'm sorry about that. It's just what the Bible says. A lot of wives don't like this idea that in the new heavens and new earth, this whole husband and wife arrangement is not going to be a thing. According to the Scriptures, marriage is an earthly institution. This is not something that you're going to carry with you. No marrying or giving in marriage and resurrection, as Jesus tells us. This is how it is. So what is Stacy to you, Chad? She is your wife, of course. Perhaps a more eternal relationship is that she is, in fact, your sister in Christ. I mean, this is true, is that if you're a married couple and you're both believers, that

yes, you have a spouse, you have a husband, or you have a wife, but what you permanently have as a brother or sister in Christ. Yeah, that makes a lot more sense of the imagery here. It's kind of the eternal perspective that's being offered. So yeah, back to verse 9, she has captivated his heart with, in fact, with one glance of your eyes. That's all it took. One look.

Love at first sight, as we might say. You capture my heart with one glance of your eyes, with one jewel of your necklace so one look at her and he's smitten in other words that's all it took his heart was immediately was immediately stolen verse 10 how beautiful is your love my sister my bride how much better is your love than wine and the fragrance of your oils and any spice we've seen this comparison of love to wine the intoxicating nature of of love more than once And we'll see it some more in the, uh, the song as we go on, but just reaffirming what he's already said before that being in love with her is more intoxicating than any wine

on earth could ever make him. And then, uh, I mean, we kind of get back to the sensual imagery here in, in verse 11, of course, all the descriptions of everything from her eyes to her cheeks, to her hair, to her neck to her teeth to her breast in that opening section was very very sensual with you know some double entendres going on there was some of this but here he's going to shift back to that and he says your lips drip nectar my bride honey and milk are under your tongue the fragrance of your garments is like the fragrance of lebanon put that on your valentine's card hey those yeah pretty sweet kisses sweet kisses going on there yeah that's uh hey man

nectar is not a word that you use a lot uh i mean we might talk about honey i mean i don't use this language but you know if you see somewhere some romance poetry or whatever you have your your lips are like honey your honeyed kisses yeah all right i could i could see that you know sticky sweet but milk maybe not so much nectar is just like that's like uh your lips are like some super ripe fruit man like i feel like if i i feel if i go take a bite of that there's i'm gonna have you know it's not and it's not gonna be one of those you know sugar rush well you know you ever you ever got a peach uh out of season and then you're it's like a peach a peach that's not ready to be eaten is the worst it's all like it's all like hard not sweet it's terrible yeah so

disappointing yeah it's like you're expecting the very best and you get the worst or a plum for that like like a like a plum that's like ready to like the right plum is amazing like you almost can't believe the nature it exists in nature like how does this even happen uh and that's what he's saying he's saying these lips look like they're they're ripe they're like if i if i if i go get a bite of that i'm gonna have nectar dripping down my face yeah yeah time time for some sweet some sweet kisses yeah and i mean that's exactly what he's describing here with her her lips are dripping nectar and honey and milk are under her tongue and not only that but she smells really good too because the fragrance of her garments is like the fragrance of lebanon and lebanon really

gets uh a lot of cred you know i mean he tells a lot of the bible in the ancient or eastern general it's the place to be i mean he tells her that she's gotta leave there uh to come to where he is but also consistently you're like i don't know it sounds pretty good man like every any time you're complimenting something it's like the blank of lebanonic it's the trees it's the smells it's I mean I don't know what's going on there apparently back in the day that was a good place to be or at least you know what they had a lot of resources that were

desirable yeah I don't think anybody would have said back in that day can anything good come from Lebanon no because the response would have been what are you talking about everything comes from Lebanon Lebanon is the place to be

so she smells like Lebanon she tastes like nectar and honey and milk he's he's obviously enjoying himself so verse 12 is going to shift again verse 12 and 13 and well really on to on to 15 we're going to have some uh some more kind of fruit imagery but also spices and garden imagery so here's i'll just go ahead and read the next three or four verses beginning with 12 a garden locked is my sister my bride a spring locked a fountain sealed your shoots are an orchard orchard by the way is uh pardes it's where do we get paradise from

it doesn't mean that here but eventually that becomes the it's taken into greek and uh paradise which we usually associate of course with eden that's where we get our word for that persian word so your uh your shoots are an orchard a paradise they might say a pomegranates with all choices fruits henna with nard nard and saffron calamus and cinnamon with all trees of frankincense myrrh and aloes with all choice spices and then we're back to the garden that's where he ends this a garden fountain a well of living water and flowing streams from any guesses where these flowing stream would come from i'm guessing i'm guessing it's not flowing from any other place but one place it's got to be lebanon yeah that's that's it wasn't that wasn't nazareth huh wasn't

the flowing certainly no no no flowing streams coming from nazareth everything everything good comes from lebanon no no uh no paradise uh uh paradise of orchards uh in in uh galilee none of that going on none of that none of that so most people most commentators who are are describing this section say this is actually all leading up to what's going to be coming next which we'll get to in just a minute where there's an invitation basically to uh visit the garden to uh eat its choices fruits so and it makes sense that all of this description that we covered last time of the various parts of her body and uh what we've just talked about in this episode and what what i just read with all the the smells and the taste and everything and with

the description of a garden that this is all leading up to what's going to be kind of the consummation so most people will explain this is this is all leading up to the the consummation of of the marriage and it it makes sense i mean there's been a a lot of language in here about bride which is which is new so i think it was verse nine where we first saw this no no it was verse eight my bride verse nine my bride verse 10 my bride verse 11 and 12 also my bride so it's kind of the you can picture a lot of this as sort of a i don't know a wedding night poem we might say well the marriage has ended and he's walking arm and arm with her to to the bedroom kind of idea and he's just like waxing poetically about her body and with all the various parts of nature

drawn into the poetry to describe who she is and he ends with this image of a well a garden or a spring or or a fountain the reason it's described as locked is because it's it's inaccessible you can't get to it but it's about to be unlocked yeah that's what i was it's about to open up yeah yeah i mean that he starts by saying like come on over here like up till this point uh there's uh i got this there's this uh garden there's this spring there's this fountain and they're locked up but i'm about to got the key i'm about to pull out this key and unlock all that and uh yes that just seems pretty obvious that that's uh that's what's going on there yeah that's uh that's it uh garden imagery is pretty pretty common in ancient or eastern

love poetry it makes sense i mean you think of a a beautiful place with all kinds of trees and flowers and herbs and you know it it looks beautiful it's it's enticing it's uh it smells wonderful you know when you go in that you can you know pluck the fruit from the trees you can enjoy yourself it's usually cool and all of this is just a perfect way to describe this woman who's waiting for him to enter into the garden and to and to enjoy enjoy being there enjoy being there with her so it's locked uh the springs locked the fountain sealed but yeah no he's he's walking inside and she just i don't think there's a lot we need to say about the various parts of this you've orchard of pomegranates you got all the choice fruits you got all of these various spices

uh henna and i mean calamus cinnamon trees of trees of frankincense myrrhs aloes so on and so forth so every every good smell that you can imagine every good taste that you can imagine is there and uh it's a place not where it's dry there's these rivers of you know wells of living water that's a john for imagery there you know living waters is running water well it's not like a stagnant pool where you look into it you're like i don't want to drink that it's just like these cascading living living waters so that's how he describes her and then uh at the very end we uh we have a couple of verses and uh it's debated as to who says these so she might be saying this awake oh north wind and come oh south wind blow upon my garden and let its spices flow

or, or he might be saying it. We're not sure. It really doesn't matter whether she says it or whether he says it. She's going to speak in probably the closing couple of lines. So this is the very end of 16. We've kind of come to this, this consummation moment. Awake, O north wind, and come, O south wind. Blow upon my garden. Let its spices flow. Let my beloved come to his garden and eat its choicest fruits so there you go that's just that's just uh that's just bringing on language that's definitely bringing on language yeah this is the the door to the bedroom has closed and uh they are in each other's arms that's exactly what we have come to now so she welcomes him in other words the garden is locked but she says let my beloved come to his

garden and eat its choicest fruits. So they are finally together in this paradise, in this garden, and they are enjoying the gift of one another's love. And that's the end of chapter four. I don't know that we need to add very

much. I mean, you get to the point where it's like, you know what's happening here. Yeah, it's interesting, because the way that you might be like, oh, it's kind of a weird way for four to end, but it actually ends in the right spot, I think, because five, you fast forward it's like you get all you know imagine you're watching a movie and you're starting to get

uncomfortable because you have a feeling about what's about to happen and you're like oh and you're like you know you need to get fast forward uh you gotta cover your kids eyes i don't know whatever it is you gotta do and uh yeah but then it just jumps scene jumps and uh you are now after the fact this is how four and five worked yeah and i remember this uh one of my favorite novels is Les Mis and there's this one line where the lovers on their wedding day are you know the walking hand in hand into the bedroom and you're like okay is he gonna go further but I wish I could quote it from from memory but he basically says and the door closes and then he adds some line like and dear reader you know we will not enter therein you know it's just kind of

leave it leaving it there so this is another one of these where these chapter divisions were it really should have gone on into into five because five one is the closing scene here and this is where so she said all this you know into the garden enjoy eat its fruits enjoy yourself he says verse five i came to my garden my sister my bride well there he makes it explicit right he calls his sister and his bride his garden this is where he's at and what did he do while he was there He says, I gathered my myrrh with my spice, I ate my honeycomb with my honey, I drank my wine with my milk. And then we have this closing couple of lines, which is mostly interpreted as kind of this chorus. And it's not like they're there, but they're just kind of in the background

singing, affirming what's happening. And they say, eat, friends, drink, and be drunk with love. Now, to me, this is how I read this. So the first verses of chapter 5, he doesn't say that he's going to do this. He says that he did do this. Like, I came to my garden. Like, I gathered, ate, drank. This is all past tense. Like, this is something that I did.

Almost like, imagine, this is super weird to us, I suppose. But if you have, I don't know, like a royal marriage, and a marriage ain't really a marriage until it's consummated. Now, I don't know, who knows what all the traditions and stuff at this time are in this place. But imagine you consummate this marriage, you come out, and people need to know. And basically, in my mind, you have here the groom coming out and saying, like, it is done. like i've done this thing i've done this thing i've done this thing and everyone's like all right well we got a queen now like everybody's time is that's it's time to party right so they say everyone eat everyone drink uh it's it's done uh which is a weird thing like i said it's like a

guy coming out i guess and telling all his friends like mission accomplished you know right yeah yeah yeah i mean so when we you kind of take a step back from this and you think in terms of christ and his church i mean i can i can think of at least a couple different ways in which even though this is not the way we ordinarily speak about this relationship it fits i mean you ultimately i mean let me start at the end you had the marriage supper of the lamb right in the marriage feast the lamb when you finally it's a consummation of all things literally when christ returns and the new jerusalem ascends from heaven like a bride adorned for her husband you have this coming together of christ with his church in the new creation and all of this

language would apply apply to that but we have i mean we have foretaste of that every time the church gathers with churches the bride gathers with christ her groom at the supper i mean this is all of these are foretaste of the feast which is which is to come so you could even take this language of the end of four beginning of five and apply it to to the supper as well where it's it's marriage feast and yeah we're it's we're awaiting that final feast but even now we are enjoying this meal with our beloved this coming together this intimate union of christ and his bride here in this world yeah yeah all right well then it then it seems like she goes you know she goes to sleep and that typical guy fashion he just like gets up in the middle of the night and

vanishes yeah this is so i i think i'm pretty sure i can say this uh with 100 certainty that this section coming up is one of the one of the stranger sections uh of of the song so this is going to be another one of these themes of searching the city and we saw this what was that back in chapter three you know where she she goes in search of her of her beloved you know where's he at? And she's searching the highways and the byways. She's searching the streets and the other ways of this town. And she sees the guards out. She talks to them. You've seen my beloved. And finally she finds him, right? And brings him home. Well, this is another one of these kinds of scenes, except the parallels end and things get kind of strange toward the end

because she gets beat up by by the guards of the by the guards of the city so that man you you read the the the studies on on song songs and they take this all kinds of different ways i don't know i one of the commentaries i read understood this whole thing to be a highly metaphorical description of her losing her virginity and i read i read his exposition i read his arguments it just I didn't buy it. I don't think that I think the language here is a bit would be pressing it too much

to describe their wedding night. So I don't go that route. So I probably didn't look at all the commentaries like you did, Chad, but the thing is that the Church has Christ, but ever since the Ascension, the Church is anticipating the return of Christ, and asking Christ to return.

How long, O Lord? Yeah, asking Christ to return. Come quickly, Lord Jesus. And as the bride of Christ, even though we are explicitly told where to find him until he ultimately comes and returns for us, what is certainly true of the Church in all times is that they get distracted and oftentimes look for him

where he is not said to be. and we do this today, of course, and you're sort of looking for Jesus in places that he hasn't said that you can be certain to find him as you wait for him to, you know, come and take you home. Is that what's going on here? I don't know for sure. I can't say for sure that the analogy is that, but I think it works somewhat, because I do think that in a lot of these quests that you might go on to go get a little hint of Jesus somewhere, go try to find Christ somewhere, you do end up just getting beat up

because he's not said that that's where he is, and you will leave disappointed and maybe find something you weren't looking for, you know, or some kind of false Christ or whatever. And that is kind of how the gospel narrative works, is that Christ has come. He has accomplished his mission to, like, have his bride, to obtain his bride, and now he is not with us. He is found in certain places in the Word and in the Supper and in baptism, this kind of stuff.

But physically, you know, we are waiting for his return, and the Church is, from the very beginning, a little secret here, guys, every generation believes that this must certainly be the generation that Christ is going to return for His bride, going all the way back to the very first Christians, that you're like, surely He will come for us, right? So I don't know. Those are—that's one way I look at it. And I don't know if that makes sense of all the language,

but maybe makes sense of the overall theme of this section. Yeah, well, we didn't talk about this before we started recording, but it turns out we're both on the same page there. Yeah, I think this is— Well, so I know we don't have time to even to read the verses yet, but this is kind of, I guess, a prelude for what we can talk about next time. But, you know, you think about how many times in the scriptures Christ calls his church, you know, wanting her to come to him. And in Song of Songs, in these verses, in chapter five, he's going to knock on the door, you know, and at first she doesn't want to get up. Well, I'm already in bed. You know, I don't want to get my feet dirty. I want to get dressed.

And there's a, I think there's a direct reference to this in Revelation chapter three, verse 20, where Christ speaking to the church of Laodicea says, behold, I stand at the door and knock. You know, I'm, I'm here. So it fits with many times in Isaiah, as well as even in the gospels where Christ is knocking, he's calling, he's waiting, and he's wanting his bride to come to him. And sometimes when she does, she looks from the wrong places. And I think it flows with these verses, whatever this is, the next eight verses of chapter 5. Fits with the overall framework of that. We'll unpack that some more next time,

but that's kind of the direction we're going with this. Christ shows up, he knocks, he calls, and he's waiting for his church to answer and to find him the place he's promised to be. All right. look at us not talking about it beforehand on the same page it's great uh the holy spirit today must be so all right man well uh i will see you next episode all right see you then I'll see you next time.